The Real Issue in the Boeing Case: The Right to Strike

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To Republicans presidential candidates, the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) decision to issue a complaint against the Boeing corporations shows a pro-labor administration run amuck. To many labor supporters, the decision signals an Obama administration, after years of neglect, finally taking a stand for labor rights. In reality, the Boeing case stands for something far different: how depressingly little remains of the right to strike in the United States.

The NLRB alleges Boeing retaliated against strike activity by members of the International Associations of Machinists (IAM) by transferring a line of production of the 787 Dreamliner aircraft from Washington State to South Carolina. Boeing CEO Jim McNerney publicly stated that Boeing built the billion-dollar facility in South Carolina because of “strikes happening every three to four years in Puget Sound." The NLRB cites an impressive line of cases holding such comments unlawful.

On June 30, Administrative Law Judge Clifford Anderson rejected Boeing’s motion to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim. “This reaffirms what we have said all along, that Boeing provided no facts or legal basis as to why the case should be dismissed,” said Connie Kelliher, spokeswoman for Machinists Union District Lodge 751. “The case will now proceed to a trial, as it should, on its merits.”

The words of the Wagner Act, passed in 1935 during the heart of the Great Depression, ring clear with support for collective bargaining and the right to strike. “Employees shall have the right” declares the Act “ … to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.”

Congress made it a violation of law for employers to interfere with such rights. Supporters of the Act believed collective bargaining backed by a strike could level income inequality, stimulate the economy by increasing purchasing power and bring democracy to workplaces.

However, as we are seeing with the attack on public-sector collective bargaining, corporate America does not believe in the right to collective bargaining. For decades, anti-labor conservatives used their influence in Congress and the courts to undermine the right to strike. The strike, once a force capable of lifting workers out of poverty and transforming the wage structures of entire industries, has become a feeble tool, rarely employed by unions. Whereas major strikes (those of over a thousand workers) averaged 350 per year through the 1950s, the number plummeted to an average of 20 per year in the last decade.

Corporate America, working though Congress and their allies in the courts have gutted the right to strike. Despite the Wagner Act’s clear prohibition against employer discrimination for strike activity, judges hold that employers can “permanently replace” striking workers. At the same time, effective union tactics, including solidarity, have been outlawed.

As a rare exception to this trend, Boeing workers dared to strike for eight weeks in 2008. Decades ago, it would have been a routine strike, one quickly forgotten. However, to Boeing executives, and corporate America in general, any strike activity is too much. So Boeing executives created a billion-dollar facility in South Carolina to grind Boeing workers into submission.

One of the few remaining slivers left of the legal right to strike—and it is only a sliver—is that employers are not supposed to openly admit they are retaliating against workers for exercising their right to strike. Employers are supposed to use code words to explain their actions; to say they are transferring work for “lower labor costs” or a “better business climate.”

Which brings us to the real legal issue in the Boeing case: Will an employer too stupid or too brazen to use such euphemisms suffer any consequences?

The underlying problem, and the real threat to the right to strike, is not even part of the debate over the Boeing charges. For decades, it has been taken for granted that it is management’s prerogative to shift production. This viewpoint represents management’s “values and assumptions” imposed upon the labor movement through decades of court decisions.

In contrast, the traditional union movement believed that human labor had value; that workers had an interest in the plants that their very labor had created. As one sit-down striker stated in justifying the famous 1937 auto strike in Flint Michigan, “our hides are wrapped around those machines.”

In every area of society, capital demands more and more prerogatives. In the realm of politics, a Supreme Court majority subservient to Corporate America is freeing capital from restrictions on its exercise of political power. In the realm of employment law, courthouse doors are being slammed shut by limitations on class action suits. In state after state, anti-labor conservatives are attacking the public sector because they detest the very idea of a sphere of society not subservient to market forces. And, as the Boeing case demonstrates, what little that remains of the legal right to strike is under assault.

The NLRB should be defended for issuing charges against Boeing. Boeing was trying to punish Washington state workers for striking and to prevent them from striking in the future. But let’s not let Republicans define this debate. With the halls of justice slammed shut, politics thoroughly corrupted and our economy in shambles, working people need the right to strike. That will take much more than requiring the use of euphemisms; it will take restoring the original promise of the Wagner Act.

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The Machinists Union Leaders encouraged membership to approve the contract offer in 2008 which specifically granted the Company the right to move new work to a new plant. the Union had their chance to stop the move at that point, but they caved. The Union Leadership should be ashamed of themselves.

Posted by truth on 2012-07-27 16:12:28

In Joe Burns recent book "Reviving the Stirke", he cites the 2008 Boeing Machinist Strike as a successful one; production was halted for eight weeks, and replacement workers were not allowed into the assembly areas. The Boeing company met or exceeded almost all of the Union's demands. The final version of the contract put before the membership was endorsed by Union leadership, and 75% of the members voted "Yes" to accept the contract. Unfortunately, the contract included Article 21, specifically section 21.7, page 82, which basically grants the Boeing company the right to move aircraft assembly work out of the existing facilities. One year after signing that Labor contract, the Boeing company began construction of a new assembly plant for the 787 aircraft in South Carolina, at a cost of 750 million dollars. This facility was recently completed, and Boeing is now beginning to assemble aircraft at this new site with non-union labor in this right-to-work state. In light of these developments, I have to ask the question: Was the 2008 Boeing Machinist Strike truly a victory for Labor? Why did Union leadership apparently endorse and encourage union members to vote yes to a contract which would ultimately lead to work being moved out of the Union facility? Why is there apparently no discussion within the Labor community about this missed opportunity to prevent a giant employer from moving work away from Union labor? It is especially puzzling to understand when Labor clearly had a position of strength after stopping production for eight weeks, at an estimated cost to the Boeing Company of 100 million dollars per day. Quit blaming Capital, the Courts, and the Government for Labor's problems; this was Labor's fumble, and that's the "Real" issue.Posted by phil bryans on 2011-09-17 05:41:18